Sunday, February 25, 2018

Book Review: The Dead Road (Book Three of the Reviver Trilogy) by Seth Patrick

The Dead Road (Book Three of the Reviver Trilogy)by Seth PatrickFebruary 27, 2018MacmillanPublisher: Thomas Dunne BooksASIN: B074DZ2QZL ISBN: 9781250021748The third in Seth Patrick's genre-bending trilogy, following Reviver and Lost Souls, delivers chilling twists as a forensic detective revives the dead to exhume a world-changing conspiracy.

Opening with The Reviver and continuing in Lost Souls, this genre-bending series has been described as CSI meets The Sixth Sense. The trilogy takes place in our world, but with a chilling twist: certain people have the ability to wake the recently dead for testimony that is accepted in courts worldwide. The use of these so-called Revivers has long been a routine part of police investigation. But things are changing...something vast and dangerous is hiding in the dark, just waiting to wreak havoc on our world.

The Dead Road is where it all comes to an end―maybe literally.

Revivers are those who can revived the dead for last goodbyes or for testimonies accepted in courts. Jonah Miller works for Forensic Revival Service, though at this point in the story, after the terrible events of Winnerden Flats, he’s in hiding and lives in the Radio Quiet Zone in Virginia with his girlfriend, Annabel Harker. His best friend, Never Geary, head of tech at the Richmond, Virginia office of Forensic Revival Service, still works there, but knows where his friend and Annabel are and visits them. Jonah can see the shadows on human hosts, parasitic things that live off the living force of those they attach to. They are a connection to the Beast, who was thought to have been defeated. An aurora borealis has appeared in the skies as far south as Virginia and frightening events began to happen. When a government spook they knew, Kendrick was found dead in a building that had been fire bombed, Jonah revives him and learns more. The oceans and rivers surge full of darkness in major cities around the world.

The Dead Road is Lovecraftian apocalyptic horror that caught my interest. Most of the book kept me stuck to the pages until the end. I am not certain what Seth Patrick wanted from the other world the Beast came from—more Lovecraft type gods, or demons and angels. Even Greek mythology had been mixed in the tale. And a bit of the last part of the book was too simple, the winning was too easy. Which is why I gave the novel 4 and not 5.

I give The Dead Road 4 sheep.

Pamela K. Kinney

About the Author:website-twitter-amazonSeth Patrick was born in Northern Ireland. An Oxford mathematics graduate, he spent thirteen years working as a games programmer on the award-winning Total War series before becoming a full-time author. He lives in England with his wife and two children.